Gheorghe

As I say, as a listener and spectator I didn´t see any signs of prima donna behaviour from Ricky Ford and it was only the interval of one year, late summer 1976-late summer 1977, and as much as I remember and I think it can also be seen on video clips, Mingus was more docile at that time. He was not anymore the "Angry Baron" . Sometimes you had the feeling that it was more Danny Richmond who pushed to players. Especially on those tunes where there is more ostinato bass ("For Harry Carney" and the first section of the suite "Cumbia and Jazz Fusion" as we observed, Mingus just plucked the ostinato bass figure and had a quite vacant look. He came a bit to live during the few short soloes he played (intro of "Noddin´ Ya Head Blues", the short bass solo after the Mingus´ vocal rap in the middle part of "Cumbia" after they switch from Db back to F, then that short Walter Page like bass line on "Three or Four Shades" , and I think instead of an encore he would let Danny Richmond play a drum solo. But it is also possible he played a very short closer too. Man, that happened 45 years ago, I say I think I remember Mingus didn´t have that dominant role he once had (and which I didn´t witness on stage) . But the music, I remember very very much of it, since the first thing I did when gettin home was to analize "Cumbia" and search posibilities to get it rehearsed together with some fellow friend musicians....

Bob Neloms must have been on schedule (I don´t remember in what context) at Wiesen Jazzfestival 1980. I remember this event very well, because the then budding fellow pianist Thomas Barth (I played bass for him on some occasions), who was only 15 years old then but had a lot of talent even then, met some of the musicians, especially pianists and asked them for some advices for a young budding jazz musician. He first asked Ronnie Matthews (with Griffin Quartet) and Matthew told him "don´t just play something, say something !". After that he met Bob Neloms, who seemed to be a bit juiced but made an astute statement: "well, and take care WHAT you say!".......

Thank you. "fame went to his head" is a good interpretation. It is interesting, that from the 76-77 band, I have not heard much about the players otherwise than with Mingus. Bob Neloms, Jack Walrath, Ricky Ford, (and Danny Mixon before Neloms)... I had not heard their names before it and not very very much after it. (Ricky Ford I think did an interview for DB about his time with Mingus, and that Mingus had given him the nick "Ricky Ticky".

Oh yes thank you ! I haven´t listened to the tracks for some time, but remember the Patanjali well and the Don´t Stop the Carnival is so groovy on this version, but very very short, it was only the closer. It has a bit another groove and is at a slower pace than the usual versions. On the other hand, I remember that I found the tune "Professor Paul" quite boring.

At first listening (and this was after hearing my first Mingus 3-LP with Dolphy in Paris, the albums with McPherson maybe were a bit a disappointment to me ("Mingus at Monterey" and "My Favourite Quintet", but now I really like them. He sounds like a more mellow Bird maybe with a softer reed (maybe in the later years 1953,54). Since Mingus played with Bird in that period I think he chose McPherson for that "Bird Sound". It´s very significant on his solos in the jam session "Mingus at Carnegie Hall 1974 ten years later.

Didn´t he play with Sonny Rollins ? Isn´t he on one of those Road Session albums ?

Dusk in Sandi, like Glass Enclosure seems to be a more classical aproach composition. They are very short compositions. It´s strange I have not played "Sandi" for 40 years but just writing now I still have it in the head and if I have it in the had I can play it. Though it never was part of my repertory (I don´t perform solo, I perform with combo) I had to play it since an expatriate US saxophonist always requestet it. After a gig, he asked me to get back on piano and play "Dusk in Sandi" just for him. Once I said "but I know so many other beautiful ballads" he insisted I play that one tune.... Those two tunes don´t appear on other recorded sources, though I think "Glass Enclosure" at least once was recorded with Mingus and Taylor at Birdland. It is possible it was such an ugly and cheap looking LP where date and personnel were on a little paper that was glued on the backcover (I once heard that Boris Rose "produced" records like that).... But I think the material is on the four ESP Disks "Spring-Summer-Autumn-Wintersessions)

Leo live in my hometown Viena in his later live. Sorry to say he had a stroke that left his fingers on one hand impaired. I used to meet him on many occasions at Jazz Spelunke where we talked and he was tellin me how he works to get back playing. He had that rubber ball to get back the strenght in his fingers. Eventually he got back playing. Played a gig with Clark Terry that was on video, can be heard on the second CD of Dizzy in Hamburg 1978. His wife Elly who is from Viena, is a very very fine singer.

Dear Walter ! Very nice what you did ! I didn´t know the Konitz solo and from hearing I thought you improvising and use some of the typical Konitz phrasing in your solo.

Pharoah Sanders "Healing Song" on "Live at the East" Ornette Coleman I already mentioned "Garden of Souls" and would like to add the theme of "New York" on "Ornette at 12" and the String Version on "Prime Design-Time Design". Mingus: Meditation on Integration, Orange is the Colour of her Dress Charlie Parker: "Parker´s Mood" Dizzy Gillespie: "I waited for you" Bud Powell: "Round Midnight" (on the 1962 video in Copenhaga, where he seems to play it exclusively for a girl in the audience). Miles Davis: "When I Fall in Love" (1956 Prestige), "My Funny Valentine" (1964) John Coltrane: "A Love Supreme" (the Seattle version), "Naima" (1966 Village Vanguard again) Dave Liebman: "Your Lady" (Coltrane tune on "Drum Ode"), this is 9 examples okay? And for the 10th my only non jazz input: "Hildegard Knef:Für mich soll es rote Rosen regnen"

What a pity there´s no record of Monk playing in Mexico. He did a long interview there, that´s what remained, but the music ?

good choice. Lonely Woman was a favourite of my mother until a few years ago. "He Loved Him Madly" is also a very interesting thing, I loved it but haven´t listen to it for many years, good idea to listen to it again.

I love that tune, heard it on many occasions live by Dizzy and like to play it myself. I like the arrangement of the out chorus, it´s wonderful to play. A trumpet player I worked with on several occasions (very fine, student of Ack Van Royen in Amsterdam, had played with greats like the late Barry Harris) loves that tune and I enjoy playing it with him in the group. He even once had a small group named "Ceora". Wonderful tune, A Flat.....yeah ! My input here: "Garden of Souls" by Ornette Coleman !!!!!!

Would like to read something about it. Since I was audience only. Usually the shows started with "For Harry Carney" and it was a fantastic contrast between the quiet parts and a growing tension, each soloist playing duets with Danny, and Mingus´ solo was up into the highest register of the bass, really very impressive....

So many great answers @sgcim: Dominican Republic.... My wife and me have been there many many times, but didn´t know that they get so heavy drunk to live music. We liked the music, but maybe because we both have to avoid stress and not want anything other than relax and enjoy the beachs, the palms and the water, the warm weather, for the last 10 or more years we never went outside the huge hotel complexes were we have everything, good food, swimming, sunbath, and from evening on dancing and so on... Irish weddings.....I didn´t get so much in contact with irish people, most of them in Dominican Republic, where many tourists did "St. Patrick´s Day", most of the tourists from Canada, with all of ´em dressed in green and drinkin ´ too much. Strict catolics I heard....., well I only one time played at a confessional weddings and to my astonishment it was Baptists, heard that they are in the States but didn´t even know they are here in Europe too, but it was a smooth thing, playing standards, good food, peaceful atmosphere, good payment so why not. I must admit I don´t really know much about religions. Over here, during my kid years and my teenie and twen years in big cities with leftie government it was not a point. But I think there might be some God since when my wife got ill and needed operation I said to God just in my mind "please help my wife" and after she recovered I said "if you the one who made her healthy again , I wanna thank you".... but I never understood why people should tell me when to eat meat or what meat is okay and what is "forbidden", or if I´m not allowed to sleep with a girl before gettin ´ married and so on...., @JSngry : Wedding Parties, yeah. I did that for one or two years, but it was not my best time. Divorce after the first short marriage, money was short, career was just starting to get settled, some jazz clubs closed and less audience than in the 70´s /early 80´s .... We mostly tried to make a compromis playing easy listening standards, stuff like "Someday Your Prince Will Come" "There will never be another you" "Your´s my heart only" and so on and the money would be okay. But I have three occasions with a lot of stress: a) Playing a wedding where the female singer got drunk (will tell the story later) b) Playing a wedding where we had to stay over night at the hotel and had a verbal fight who will share the room with the only lady (a stunning slim and tall blonde)... c) Playing my only non-jazz gig of shlagers, waltzes, polkas and been forced by the "bandleader" to sing a song.....

I don´t know how he acted then. With Mingus I don´t think he had time or possiblility to act like a primadonna. He was very articulate then, and they did all those great tunes live (Cumbia, Three or Four Shades of the Blues, Noddin Ya Head Blues, For Harry Carney ) , which sounded much better than the overproduced Atlantic Studio recordings. Jack Walrath and Ricky Ford, and on piano first in 1976 Danny Mixon (Viena and Switzerland "Willisau") and Bob Neloms 1977 (Italy). Ricky and Jack had the role of that call-response on "Cumbia" while on the studio it was also oboe and bassoon and trombone. So Ricky and Jack had to carry all the load but did a great job on that. And on that rap passage (Mama´s lil baby don´t like no shortnin´ bread....) all those honks on tenor. He was really strong, and I think he was very very young then, in his early twenties. The first time I heard him in 1976 first I was a bit disappointed that it was no more George Adams, that´s how it started.... But as for Mingus sideman it´s interesting I have albums of Adams-Pullen, but don´t have individual albums of Walrath, Ricky, Neloms or so.

Brad, DB with PD must have something, especially their "Take Five". Why are , or were so many people who otherwise didn´t like or know jazz but loved Take Five. Same with my wife: Some weeks ago the original "Take Five" was on a commercial or as a background music for a film, and she said, "that sounds fantastic". Let´s say, the alto sound really is fantastic, it´s something else than my usual Jackie McLean, Dolphy, Lyons, Donald Harrison, and of course Bird .... The only time I played "Take Five" was with a very very strange male singer with a quite hoarse and shouting voice but it worked for the more jazz rock oriented audience and he demanded "Take Five" in a Reggae groove. This was during my few years deeply into electric jazz, but it sounded fine and I felt good...

No, Tete was not on it, it was pianoless , just the four mentioned musicians. And I found it also on youtube from Italy for RAI television. Same tunes, but only the first three, Salt Peanuts misses. About Tete: Sorry to say I saw him only once, and that could have been in 1980 with Joe Henderson. I remember this because we all very not pleased at all with the bass and the drums, they just didn´t lit the fire and at one moment Tete "rescued" the evening by waving torward the bass and drum to lay out and played the walking line himself with the left hand and finally it grooved. I don´t remember who the drummer and the bassist were, I heard Joe on many occasions, allways fantastic, But without Tete at that certain date he would have been lost....

Yes, that´s it. In books about jazz in the 40´s like Ira Gitler´s book and others, the "Bop for the people" wasn´t mentioned very much. See, for dudes from Europe who were born after the 40´s , we didn´t know very much about groups that may have had a short time fame, but nevertheless the "Bop for the People" is something I had heard about. And that tune "High on an Open Mike" was for eternity through the 1947 "Saturday Night Jazz Session" which we all bought in the 70´s mostly for the participation of Fats Navarro. I remember my English was very weak and depended on my understanding of the liner notes. But the title "High on an Open Mike" was ununderstandable for me then. "Mike" was the english name for "Mihail" or "Michael" how I knew it and I translated it in "Hoch auf einem offenen Michael" (I think only Google-Translate can do worse), but it is an interesting Ventura original with some "swing to bop" elements. The A part is based on "If I had You" and the bridge is a descending chord thing, very very nice to play really...... Benny Green is really cool, but I think on that WNEW Saturday Night stuff it was Bill Harris on tb, who sounds more old fashioned for our understanding, a bit more Dixieland style if I´m right.

I saw Mraz in 1985 with Flanagan and Art Taylor at Holabrunn Festival and thanks God he had got rid of that "guitar like" shit than and really played bass. But those two basses on "Me Myself" sound like "Dünnschiss".....

It´s possible that Jackie Cain and Roy Kral were not as well known in Austria.... I have read about them as being part of Charlie Ventura´s "Bop for the People" project. Is that true ?

The interesting thing is that so many Dexter live in Copenhagen came out after the first series (those from 1964). I had and still have those "I want more", "King Neptune" "Cheesecake" and to a lesser amount the first one "Cry me a River" (where I only liked the title ballad, since "April" sounds very weak, and the side without Dexter didn´t really interest me). But I eventually stopped collecting them. I had invited an american jazz musician with whom I had the honour to play, to have dinner at my home and when when he browsed through my "collection" and said "Dexter, Dexter, Dexter, Dexter" he told me that a few significant Dexter albums is very fine, but with the money you might also get others to study them and to enlarge my horizont, I thought he is right and so I didn´t continue. Maybe I lost the trace, but is it true that the later Steeplechase albums were not as well advertised as the first one had been ? Right now my Dexter Collection is the Savoy 45-47, the Dial with Wardell Gray, the BN´s "Go" and "Man in Paris", the CBS "Homecoming" and "Manhattan Symphony" ....

@sgcim Thank you so much for that story, which is really a scary thing. You say a duo gig with a piano player.... what instrument you playing, bass ? I really enjoyed reading it and hope you did like my story too. And I want to thank you not only for your great story, but also that you decided to write it. And I also hate to see a thread without any posts. I was really confused, when I didn´t see any post after almost a week. I had thought it is best placed in the musicians forum, but would be interesting for non musicians too, since many of them like "jazz stories". I could write dozens of them (with the limitations of my knowledge of english, which I mostly learned from reading liner notes and jazz books) . Maybe we can invite others to post here too, and so our efforts to write more stuff will not be in vein.

I remember Ray Drummond was one of the most busy young bass players in the late 70´s early 80´s . I saw him very often with different great stars, until he became Johnny Griffin´s permanent bassist. And he, together with Stafford James played the bass in a very forceful manner, not like those who got the strings lower down to play faster (guitar like) without the real "bass sound". Everytime when I listend to Mingus´ "Me Myself an Eye" with Gomez and Mraz sharing the bass part, I wonder how it would have sounded if they would have had Ray Drummond and Stafford James.....much better I suppose.

Great music and some of the all time best musicians involved. But though I like a to smoke a cigarette myself while having coffee or after dinner or after ...... ( ) ........ I wouldn´t bite the filtru that way Is this Cecil Bridgewater ? Who is the else ? The only Bridgewaters I saw live and admired were Cecil and Dee Dee....